Dawn of Thunder: The Invisible War
by Tyr44
Summary: The Aschen are on a warpath, the Romulans are preparing for one valiant defense of their homeworld. Meanwhile the Alliance takes the first uneasy steps towards liberating the protectorate worlds, ignorant of the war raging onwards.


Disclaimer-I, nor ChaosEternus, own Stargate, Star Trek, or any of the other random crossover that will appear.

Romulan-Aschen Border.

Decades ago, this area of space would have been considered useless to its current occupants. A barren, inhospitable system that held no value but a simple colony world. But with the recent turn of events, its strategic value was enormous, right on the very doorstep of the Romulan home system, the Cardius system, once safely protected by the light years of territory that expanded far from beyond the home system, it was now the very front lines against the Aschen war machine. Half a dozen of the older, purple hued warbirds flashed into the star system through hyperspace, flocking to the defense, accompanied by nearly one hundred of smaller, but no less dangerous escort and fast attack vessels, mostly in the form of frigate sized Bird of Preys. The pitiful system defense forces could sigh in relief that the full might of the Romulan Empire was coming to their aid.

Vice-Admiral Remelac, commander of the freshly arrived Battlegroup could not but literally sit on the edge of his seat, though he made every measure to hide it from his subordinates around him. The graying haired Romulan held an air of confidence, every one of his species military usually did, their egos wouldn't allow anything to the contrary. His features had an underlying look of doubt, despite the propaganda, civilian or political; he knew exactly how bad this war was going for his people, as many others that were thrown at the Aschen also knew full well. Even with the full knowledge that the Aschen lacked the industry to keep up with a prolonged conflict do to their homeworld caught in the time-dilating effects of a black hole, that didn't stop them from throwing everything they had against his people after their outright refusal to hand over their knowledge in singularities, and therefore black hole manipulation. It was just down right bad luck that the whole situation began, the usually isolated empire had finally begun to spread its wings, sending dozens of warbirds of exploration missions, a Prequel to the future conquering and overall expansion of the Romulan people's influence, and ultimately, claiming their ancient masters head on a pike.

The unfortunate turn of events however, led a damaged warbird into the realm of the Aschen Confederation, specifically, their Provisional capital world to be specific. The damaged giant found itself surrounded, prodded and scanned by the powerful sensors of their soon to be enemies, after 30 minutes they received a single message. "Surrender your technological assets or prepare for annihilation." The giant Romulan starship, heavily damaged from its expedition into the strange nebula, could not hope to win against so many vessels, given that the G'revik's armaments, like most imperial starships were almost completely on a forward firing arc, being surrounded was the worst possible position to be in. It was do or die, the mighty warship ploughed forward with all her might, wilfully ignoring the sudden swarm of ion energy bolts slamming into her shields, Aschen warships of all classes unleashed their wraith relentlessly at the giant ship that was now powering for her own counter attack.

The warbirds two main pulse cannons let loose, white hot pulses crashed into its main obstacle, the port broadside of a battleship, quickly forcing its usually bright blue shields into a pale transparent cyan. It was not over either, from hidden compartment across the main hull, dozens of bright green projectiles spat out, surged ahead at slowly increasing speeds, the Aschen fired everything they could to intercept the deadly torpedoes, but the giant capital grade weaponry they relied solely on wasn't up to the challenge. The battleship and her picket defence of support ships faced the torpedoes head on, any form of evasion was futile once they detected the weapons moving to intercept, it was overkill in its finest.

The first torpedo impacted against a frigate, quickly washing over it completely before buckling its shields and literally vaporizing the small starship in explosion of plasma. Soon it was not the only victim, more frigates and cruiser that stood defiantly in the defence of their flagship, each blowing apart at the assault, the futile gesture was for naught when the ruined fleet could not hold back that the continuing assault of plasma, as it sliced through the lines and hit the battleship. The kilometres long warship broke apart, multiple explosions ripped into her bare hull, eating away at the armour like it was fire to paper. Still more torpedoes slammed into the burning wreck, if only to insult to injury, leaving not a scrap of debris to block the Romulan warship from escaping the clutches of the Aschen, it powered right through its open pathway into a rapidly forming hyperspace window, leaving the system for Romulan space.

However that wasn't the end of it, within weeks, border colonies and outposts were completely eliminated without warning. By the time they started attacking the outer colonies the Empire was mobilized, finding itself in the path of hundreds of Aschen as they took planet by planet, ship by ship in their onslaught. Oh of course his people took out huge sections of their fleet, The Romulans could more then match the Aschen ship for ship, especially with G'revik class warbirds and their heavy armament. But they were so few in number, barely over a few dozen, instead they had to throw the small and numerous birds of prey, agile and speedy Temalore cruiser against the Aschen giants, ranging from their own puny frigates, right up to out right giants stretching to starbase size. It was amazing that the Aschen had the logistics to keep up a war like this, it made the Admiral consider, was this a standard campaign for the strange humans, or simple desperation taking over the well contained logical thoughts of a Vulcan influenced race.

The war was literally at Romulus's doorstep now. This system was merely the welcoming mat. Remelac knew full well that his forces, while significant, couldn't hold the line against the Aschen, last estimates held the number of ships to be at least 70, and with them being a significant number of cruisers and battleships, thankfully none of their monstrous dreadnoughts, he guessed they were saving them for the direct attack on Romulus, but one thing unique was reported. Among the massive warships, was a relatively small and uniquely designed cruiser. Its shape was smoother then the usually bulky Aschen norm, streamlined features were everywhere across the hull, from the engines, to the forward tip, a lance like shape that stretched right through the entire ship itself, most likely a weapon of some form. All in all it came down to two things, either that ship was a new production model, or it was a unique ship for some purpose, like the dreadnoughts were used for planetary annihilation, this ship might have a similar purpose, packed into a much smaller frame. All the more deadly for that reason alone.

Now the assembled ships were here to defend, but specifically give the home system some more time to prepare. It was a naive ideal that Romulus and Remus could defend themselves against the entire Aschen armada, at least in their current state. Ships were still being built, orbital defenses in place, as well as the redeployment of other forces from across imperial space, every little bit would make a difference, and within a week or two, the system could hold against the storm successfully and maybe turn the tide. But that's if, and only if, this battle here could do enough damage to the Aschen, to at least slow them down, maybe take out a few heavies to make it easier to engage next time, but whatever the effect on the Aschen, the mission is simple, do as much damage as possible, and then jump back to Romulus, it was the reason why his ship, and the rest of the warbirds were recently refitted with additional plasma torpedo launchers, at the cost of their carrier capabilities, though he doubted a few dozen fighters would make much a difference in this battle anyway.

By now his subordinate was standing at attention to his side, holding out a small electronic data pad that demanded his immediate attention "Admiral Sir, hyperspace windows are forming on the outskirts of the system" the sub-commander remained at attention until Remelac gave a nod to relieve the young man.

"Prepare fleet wide battle alert, all cloaked ships are to remain so until my order, let them come to us, every single hour will buy Romulus some time." On his order the low pitched whine of the battle siren filled every crewmen's ears, men and women of the Romulan empire manned their station, charging weapons, shields, and putting engines on standby, every single preparation was made for battle, for after this, there will be no more running, there is only the capital, and if that falls, no matter the large amounts of colonies still remaining, and the near billions of subjects with it, the empire will die that day.

Minbari Space.

Deep inside alliance space, two ships, both of completely different design of the other were meeting, face to face. One, an organic looking blue fish-like craft that stood proud and tall, armed noticeably with several cannons that pointed forward from the various fins of the ship, while the other, smaller ship, was a more utilitarian design. It was a strong red coloured dart like shape, surrounded by a connected ring feature near its engines, a nice contrast between the organic flowing Minbari ship design, in fact almost completely to the opposite. Far off in the distance, a cover of nearly a dozen starships, made up of Vree, Minbari and Drazi frigate designs kept the defense of this meeting, the hit and run tactics of Anubis's shadow craft was not something anyone wanted to happen at this exchange.

To the casual observer, it may seem that these two ships were facing off, far from it, they'd been like this for hours, this was a diplomatic mission between the Minbari Federation and Vulcan Confederation, both members of a separate alliance with the Tau'ri. Today they hoped to change that, the initial meetings of Vulcan and Andorian ambassadors to the Narn and League Worlds had left with a somewhat successful outcome. With this final meeting with the Minbari, they hoped to solidify the two separate alliances into one overall coalition that could quite possibly be an equal to either of the Goa'uld that claimed significant sections of the known galaxy. Thankfully, even combined they didn't control any where near the entire galactic region, probably not even a quarter as last estimates put it at. Eventually it was the hopes to gather all races that resisted the goa'uld into the future alliance, the Orbanians and Hebridians, possibly the Free Jaffa, but they liked to act Independently, especially given some members of their leaderships not willing to rely on anyone but themselves, it was thankful that Bra'tac and his faction had easily kept them at bay, last thing they needed was a zealot group of Jaffa taking on anyone they felt could provide technology.

Now the Vulcan's were considering about finally moving on the offensive, being almost a year after the defense of their homeworld, and in turn the defense of Alpha Centauri, both their own, and the Andorians military forces were nearing a level in size to what they were before the great defense. That was not all however, newer technology was brought into newer ship designs, the old and tired fleets were replaced with next-generation warships, equipped with advanced weaponry such as Photon Torpedoes, pulse disruptors and particle cannons based of salvaged Aschen weaponry, not to ignore the completely new ships both nations were bringing out the newer Sh'Ran combat cruisers to replace the aging D'Kyr cruisers as the primary ship of the line. The Andorians followed a similar practice, designing and building the powerful Juveria Battlecruisers, equipped with a direct copy design of the Aschen pulse cannon as a primary weapon, and a newer hyperdrive design, perfect for hit and run tactics. This was not say that the two small interstellar nations could declare out right war against their mutual foe, but it did mean they were no longer on the defensive, the Aschen's attention was now somewhere else, so now was the time to strike. Dozens of warships assembled at the edge of Vulcan space, preparing for the day long hyperspace journey across the fifty light year wide expanse between them and Aschen space, the mission wasn't a direct campaign per say, it was an assault across their supply lines, to also scout out a possible future assault against the confederation itself, liberating the dozens of subjected human worlds and taking on the Aschen directly.

But that was thinking very far ahead, now the essential matters were taking priority, it was the reason why this meeting was happening in the first place, to further the individual alliance between the Vulcans and Minbari. The plan was to begin an early exchange of technology, before the completion of the Babylon Station, in the hopes that it broke a few of the barriers of isolation and uneasiness that many of the races in the alliance still held up.

Deep in the Sharlins layers of protection, behind the weapons, armour, even the constantly busy rooms and corridors that criss-crossed through out the ship, stood a single darkened room. In it stood a total of ten individuals, the nine grey cloaked Minbari stood in clear view, illuminated by a powerful white light. They stood in a circle, as if passing judgement on the individual alien that stood in the direct centre. He was similarly clothed, simple robes at best, if not for his closely trimmed grey hair, pointed ears, and lack of a head-bone, he would have seemed quite at home amongst the Minbari. But no, the Vulcan diplomat was weighing several things on his mind, the negotiations had not gone well, thankfully they had neither gone poorly either, but the mere fact that the opinions of the Minbari and their semi-isolated opinions on trade had not been wavered in either way, despite his efforts, was both Illogical, and a waste of his time. Still, there was final chance, if only he could get an explanation as to why the Grey Council would deny such a potentially benefiting treaty, then future efforts may possibly be more fruitful. "Is there nothing you can offer us?" he all that he uttered to those around him.

The first, separated from the rest of his kin by his great height and the staff he wielded, almost boomed out "Su'vok of Vulcan, we sympathise with your predicament, however, our own fleets are already strained in our own engagements, we cannot possibly spare even a single ship, surely you can understand our situation."

Indeed he did, every ship from the confederation and then some, poured to Vulcan for its defense, that long past day, and then the forces looked outwards, taking back what was once there's years ago, looking back at the wasteful destruction of life their former protégée committed. A clear path through Vulcan space was cut, it wasn't an attempt to completely eliminate to race through a long genocidal war, but instead to cut right to the heart, it was their favourite tactic, hoping that without the vital innards, the rest of the body would wither away and die. It was only barely that they survived, and it would be an unlikely occurrence that they could actually defeat the Aschen totally, but his government was not asking for much, if anything they were being charitable and giving away more technology then requesting. "We do not request military assistance from you Satai Dukhat, as we understand that your current war with the Goa'uld Anubis would prevent such a thing happening, however further technological exchanges may be beneficial, the loan of your Nial class fighters, even despite the fact it was an older model, has pushed our fighter development by several strides, my people doubt they could have designed such an effective craft without your help." Su'vok made sure to mention the previous successful trade, it feed the obvious Minbari arrogance that their technology was not just useful, but essential.

This time Duhkat remained silent in contemplation, allowing the worker class to take his place, the third from Satai Dukhats left spoke just as proudly as his leader "Likewise, we must thank you for your knowledge in particle shielding; it will be of great use, until of course when the treaty with the Tau'ri is finalized." An awkward silence filled the room, everyone was merely waiting for the 'but', thankfully they did not have to wait more then a few seconds until Duhkat continued.

"But, unfortunately we find it would be more prudent to wait until the Babylon Three Project is complete, maybe then a full disclosure of both our technologies may commence." Su'vok did definitely feel the slight sound of remorse in the leaders tone, maybe this wasn't his idea, the council was democratic after all. "Until then, I suggest that both of our people continue to our respective matters, however we will consider further meetings on the topic, we will inform you of the time and place." However unfortunate, the Vulcan ambassador did have to agree with the logic, however his personal feelings on the matter, and the needs for his own nation differed greatly. He bowed respectfully to the Minbari chosen one and left the chamber without a word, soon to exit into one of the Sharlins many corridors, and to the waiting escort of Confederate Guardsmen. He did not waste time from there on, after concluding his business as with a simple click on the small sliver device in its robe pocket, he, and his companions were instantly dissipated in a trio of glowing golden column. It would seem that the Vulcans and Andorians were alone in this campaign, so be it.

Alpha Centauri

Cruising directly above Alpha Prime, the refit Prometheus class heavy cruiser glided effortlessly from Ravensbright station, the massive goa'uld construct loomed protectively over Earths main interstellar colony as both its guardian and relay point. The damage done over a year ago was completely repaired, in some case the station was better then before, aging and slowly decaying armour that the goa'uld relied one was partly replaced with newer Titanium-Trinium composites, segments patching up the heavily damaged sections, leaving the station a patchwork of armour, almost like a checkerboard. But dotting across the mismatched hull itself were the new defensive lasers. The old type 8 cannons were stripped and were slowly being replaced with the newer Type 14 lasers, not exactly top of the line such as the Type 17 lasers being used on the Vipers and support craft, but still far more effective then the early generation grids.

But such thoughts of fighters and stations were the least important things on James Davis's mind, all he could really think about was the irony of the universe that he, and his ship was once again back here where it all started. He was still on his way to the bridge, but he could almost sub-consciously feel the shift of the cruiser leaving the planetary gravity well, now the safeties on the hyperdrive would disengage, faster then light travel was now possible after the distortion effects of gravity were at a minimal and safe level.

One year ago the Endeavour had left the Alpha Centauri system on a mission of exploration and evaluation. Her first jump led her into the Epsilon Eridani star system, a place which humanity will eventually come to refer to solely as the Vulcan System. In that single jump a powerful enemy unwanted attention was drawn to the Tau'ri, leading to the nearly crippling sneak attack on the Alpha Centauri system itself, but ultimately the mission itself was a success, for we gained not one, but two races to the growing allied cause.

Now, they were returning, launching from Ravensbright with their orders from both O'Neill and Thompson. The ship itself repaired and back in action after leaving Thundersdawn. It was unfortunately stuck and refitted in dry-docks during the disclosure incident that lead to the bloodiest day's Earth had seen since the World Wars, and maybe even more then that. While Drakh, Cylon and Goa'uld attacks raged across the Sol System, threatening his homeworld, Davis himself was stuck in a small training room on Freedom, teaching a dozen or so wet behind the ears officers of the Colonial Navy on capital ship engagements. This left the rest of his crew being spread across Tau'ri space, filling the gaps for crew on Earth fighting to retake the some extremely advanced alien, most likely ancient technology that if taken, would probably bring the end of Earth a few billion years early. Thankfully it turned out well in the end, relatively of course, Earths collective losses were staggering, for a battle of such a short time, but it was either that or lose the Solar System in a massive dimensional breech

But the conflict was over, Earth was secure, and quickly returning to her feet. It was time to look outwards again and as such, their first mission out of dry docks was to deliver the first load of crew and components of the Tau'ri contribution Babylon Two, the Tau'ri's controlling influence in Vulcan space. After the shifting of supplies, the Endeavour would remain in the area, joining the Dawn of Justice and Devonshire to fortify the region.

Now he past the last bulkhead into the ships bridge, nodding to nearly every crewmember he passed, a matching smile on every ones face, even his own, it was good to be back. Inside the bridge itself he marched confidently to the captain's chair, the newly promoted Commander Erin Wellings who was previously leading the ship out of docks, now noticing the captain she quickly rose to her feet and stood briskly at attention "Captain on deck!" she bellowed with sudden results.

Every person on the bridge jumped from their station and stood at attention, facing the captain, their gaze's a mix of curiosity, awe, and cold professional stares welcomed his presence, he did not care to return it "At ease."

Each officer noticeably slouched, if only slightly, Davis smirked, he knew full how much of a pain in the arse it was to be pulled from their work just to acknowledge some pompous arse who's only difference from you was a few extra lines on your shoulder, at least that's what he thought before getting his own ship of course. "I won't say much since we've got a job to do, but I will say this, keep the ship moving and the shields working, and then it will be the Aschen hauling their arses to dry-docks, not us." He said purposely dead-pan, earning a few grins from the younger officers, and even a smile from Wellings, before he broke into a smirk himself "Okay people at your stations, patch us into Ravensbright."

Ensign Yates, returning to active duty since the Endeavours last fateful mission initiated the connection, nodding to the captain for the go ahead "Ravensbright this is Endeavour actual, on final approach before hyper-jump, anything on the scanners." Davis requested, a standard procedure these days. While the Endeavour had her own FTL scanners, they weren't even half the range of Ravensbright, plus a double check was essential, the odds of a hyperspace collision were slim to nil, but if it did happen the results would be explosive to say the least, not something you'd want in a terrestrial star system that's for sure.

"Negative Endeavour, we read negative on hyperspace scans, inbound Earth-Alpha jumps are negative for 3 hours, the path is clear." Came the reply without a hint of static or otherwise annoying distortion.

"Roger Ravensbright, we are commencing jump to hyperspace, see you in a few months."

"Just make sure you don't bring an enemy fleet with you." Came a sarcastic reply from O'Neill.

The Endeavours captain grinned. "No promises General" he said with a final nod to Yates, cutting the connection.

"Course set captain, ready on your orders." Lieutenant Schneider reported crisply, an Austrian who's nation recently joined the RSS, the Endeavour was in need of navigator after Ensign Veers unfortunate death when the starship was nearly torn apart by Molum's flagship. It was a bit hard to get used get used to the mans very professional attitude after Veers usually smart arse, bordering on disobedient response to nearly everything.

Davis nodded, "Take us into hyper Lieutenant" And with that, the starship cruised forward, right in the maw of the forming distortion of a hyperspace window. Leaving the system quite once again, while they surged through the chaotic realm back into the Vulcan space, and then who knows? The unknown beckons those who wish to explore it.

Yup, it's definitely good to be back.


End file.
